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Alfonso X and Islam: Narratives of Conflict and Co-Operation in the Estoria De España

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Alfonso X and Islam: Narratives of Conflict and Co-Operation in the Estoria De España ALFONSO X AND ISLAM: NARRATIVES OF CONFLICT AND CO-OPERATION IN THE ESTORIA DE ESPAÑA by CHRISTIAN KUSI-OBODUM A thesis submitted to The University of Birmingham for the degree of DOCTOR OF PHILOSOPHY Department of Hispanic Studies School of Languages, Cultures, Art History and Music College of Arts and Law University of Birmingham August 2017 University of Birmingham Research Archive e-theses repository This unpublished thesis/dissertation is copyright of the author and/or third parties. The intellectual property rights of the author or third parties in respect of this work are as defined by The Copyright Designs and Patents Act 1988 or as modified by any successor legislation. Any use made of information contained in this thesis/dissertation must be in accordance with that legislation and must be properly acknowledged. Further distribution or reproduction in any format is prohibited without the permission of the copyright holder. ABSTRACT Medieval Iberian literary tradition constitutes a vast corpus of writings with which to study interfaith relations – in particular, Christian attitudes towards Muslims. This thesis focuses on works produced in the thirteenth century under king Alfonso X of Castile-Leon. Scholars have often looked to Alfonso X's poetry and legal texts to explore Christian responses to Islam, at a pivotal moment of Christian domination in the Peninsula. The thesis looks to Alfonso's historiography (the Estoria de España), which has received much less attention from scholars of interfaith relations. This study employs a historical-critical method of interpretation to explore the transmission and reformulation of Christian society's attitudes towards Islam. It offers a sophisticated analysis of the narratives of three prominent figures in the history of Spanish Islam: a) the Prophet Muhamad, b) Ibn Abi Amir al-Mansur, and c) King al- Mamun of Toledo. The study reveals the wide-ranging and contrasting attitudes towards Muslims visible not only in the writings of Alfonso X, but throughout the broader historiography and literature of medieval Spain. The thesis explains how these contradictions are rooted in the paradoxes of conflict and co-operation among the faiths in the Peninsula. It concludes that the ambivalence of Christian writers allows for the coexistence of both disdain and respect for Muslims in medieval society. ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS This thesis would not have been possible without the advice and support of a number of other minds. Primarily, I would like to thank my supervisor Aengus Ward, for offering me the opportunity to undertake a doctorate, as part of the AHRC-funded Estoria de Espanna Digital project. I would also like to thank Conrad James for co-supervising my thesis. Both Aengus and Conrad recognised my intellectual curiosity and encouraged me to join the research community. My colleagues from the Estoria de Espanna Digital project also deserve special mention. Thanks in particular to Enrique Jerez Cabrero, for his insight and guidance on many aspects of my thesis. I am also indebted to Ricardo Pichel Gotérrez for helping me locate a large number of works of scholarship to support my own work. I am grateful to Alicia Montero Málaga for guidance in the early stages of my research. Thanks also go to fellow PhD candidate and partner in crime Polly Duxfield, for support and motivation over the last few years. I would like to recognise and thank my parents, Kwame and Joyce, and my godparents Jenny, Michael and Esther for nurturing my development throughout childhood and adulthood. This thesis is ultimately rooted in the upbringing and education I received long before beginning my doctoral research. Finally I would like to thank my partner Jennifer for her unwavering belief in me. CONTENTS CHAPTER FIRST 1 Conflict and co-operation in medieval Iberia 1.1 The nature of interfaith conflict and co-operation in medieval Iberia 3 a) Political and military affairs 3 b) Economy and trade among religions 8 c) Faith boundaries and social interaction 13 1.2 Convivencia theories 18 1.3 Popular convivencia 33 1.4 Scrutinising the writing of history: modern and medieval historians 37 1.5 Islam and Muslims in late medieval literature 41 1.6 Islam and Muslims in chronicle tradition 48 1.7 Contradiction and ambivalence in a paradoxical world 57 CHAPTER SECOND 66 Reading interfaith relations in Alfonso X's Estoria de España 2.1 An innovative approach to Alfonso X: reading attitudes to Islam in the Estoria de España 68 2.2 Alfonso X and Islam: reading the Siete Partidas 74 2.3 Alfonso X and Islam: reading the Cantigas de Santa María 82 2.4 Interpreting Alfonso X's attitudes to Islam 91 2.5 Interpreting the Estoria de España: assumptions about the text 98 a) Authorship of the Estoria 99 b) Readership of the Estoria 102 c) The political agenda of the Estoria 106 2.6 A robust methodology for historical interpretation: source-redaction criticism 112 2.7 Hispanic philology and source-redaction criticism 121 CHAPTER THIRD 130 Narratives of Muslims in the Estoria de España 3.0 The Estoria de España: compilation and conception of history 132 3.A. The prophet Muhammad 139 A.1 Polemical tradition of the prophet Muhammad in Latin Europe 140 A.2 The significance of Muhammad in the Estoria de España 148 A.3 The Estoria de España narrative of Muhammad 154 A.3.1 Characterisation of the Prophet 155 A.3.2 The spread of Muhammad's teachings 162 A.3.3 The transmission of Muhammad's teachings in the present 165 A.4 Understanding the portrayal of Muhammad 168 3.B. Al-Mansur 173 B.1 Spanish Islam as a political and military entity in Christian historiography 174 B.2 The significance of al-Mansur in the Estoria de España 177 B.3 The Estoria de España narrative of al-Mansur 190 B.3.1 Al-Mansur's exercise of power and influence 191 B.3.2 Al-Mansur's military might 198 B.3.3 The death and legacy of al-Mansur 202 B.4 Understanding the portrayal of al-Mansur 205 3.C. Al-Mamun of Toledo 212 C.1 Christian-Muslim co-operation and strategic alliances in the eleventh-century 213 C.2 The significance of al-Mamun in the Estoria de España 219 C.3 The Estoria de España narrative of al-Mamun 223 C.3.1 Alfonso VI in exile at the court of al-Mamun 224 C.3.2 Al-Mamun and Alfonso VI against Cordoba 233 C.3.3 Al-Qadir in the shadow of al-Mamun 235 C.4 Understanding the portrayal of al-Mamun 238 CHAPTER FOURTH 247 Ambivalence in the historiography of Alfonso X 4.1 Contrasting attitudes to Muslims in the works of Alfonso X 248 4.2 Textual tradition 256 4.3 The agency of the redactor 264 4.4 The text as a reflection of historical reality 275 4.5 Historiography as moral guidance 280 4.6 Convivencia and the Estoria: reading society and the text 289 CONCLUSION 295 BIBLIOGRAPHY 300 C H A P T E R F I R S T CONFLICT AND CO-OPERATION IN MEDIEVAL IBERIA Medieval Iberia attracts the attention of scholars from many disciplines. Indeed, it is a field that entails enormous diversity of research interests: art, architecture, culture and society, numismatics, linguistics, literature, politics... the list of disciplines goes on. The allure of the Iberian Peninsula owes to its intriguing historical circumstances during Middle Ages. Separated from the tip of North Africa by scarcely nine miles of sea, the Iberia Peninsula was the frontier that stood between two of the world's great faiths: Christianity and Islam. Of course, Iberia was not the only frontier in the Mediterranean: the Balearics, Sicily and the Balkan Peninsula were equally hosts to the Christian- Muslim encounter. Over the course of nine centuries, Hispanic civilisation witnessed the contact of not only Christianity and Islam, but also a third belief system: Judaism. The three Abrahamic faiths interacted in ways that demonstrated the best and worst of human nature. The interactions that took place have accordingly provided scholars with a near- 1 infinite source of intellectual pursuits. This was a land of kings, caliphs, emperors and emirs; its languages were Latin, Arabic and Hebrew. Africans and Europeans fought for territory, traded goods and exchanged culture. The evidence for this intriguing contact is most visible in architecture and archaeology. And for the present study, it is visible in medieval writing. Poets, clerics and chroniclers engaged in the trade of insults; yet they also sang the praise of the 'other'. This was a place of conflict and co-operation among the sons of Abraham: its writers captured this expertly. In this chapter I will attempt to lay the foundations for the study of the interfaith encounter in medieval Iberia. In order to do so, I will begin with a brief exploration of the paradoxes of conflict and co-operation at the frontier. We will observe many aspects of the encounter – both constructive and destructive alike. Specifically, we will touch on political, military, economic and social history. We will then explore the notion of convivencia, and how scholars and historians of today have debated the nature of interactions among the three faiths in Medieval Iberia. Consideration for the modern narratives of medieval Iberia will equip us with a valuable perspective for historical interpretation: addressing episodes of history on a case-by-case approach. This serves a useful reflection to bear in mind for the later interpretation of the Estoria de España. I will then move on to offer a brief survey of Christian attitudes to Islam and Muslims, as fossilised in Christian historiography.
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